


Cold Construct Consequences

by GemmaRose



Category: The Transformers (IDW Generation One)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Electrocution, Energon, Flashbacks, Gen, Happy Murder Family, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Torture, My First Work in This Fandom, Pain, Team as Family, The Transformers: More Than Meets the Eye Issue 20 (IDW), potential OOC
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-22
Updated: 2017-12-22
Packaged: 2019-02-18 13:31:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,463
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13101195
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GemmaRose/pseuds/GemmaRose
Summary: One second everything is normal; the next it’s all pain.Written forMeezeras part of the writscrib literary secret santa!





	Cold Construct Consequences

**Author's Note:**

  * For [CommanderSideswipe](https://archiveofourown.org/users/CommanderSideswipe/gifts).



By all accounts, it was a normal evening on the Peaceful Tyranny. They were in orbit above a newly-deserted planet, another name neatly ticked off of The List, and the team had assembled in what passed for a rec-room aboard their ship. It was... peaceful, a sharp contrast to the energon-pounding rush of catching, subduing, and ultimately _destroying_ their latest prey. Prey who, if he wasn’t mistaken, Helex was still splattered with the fluids of. Then again, Vos could just be sitting at the other end of the couch because his Pet had made himself comfortable in the middle of it. Even odds, really.

“I wish you could see this.” Tesarus mumbled, coming to stand at his side and gently turning him to face the large pane of reinforced glass which so often drew his teammates to this room. The view it afforded, as he was so frequently told, was spectacular. If he wasn’t so used to running his coils at echolocation pitch in the background, and his sockets weren’t irreparably damaged, he might’ve been tempted to get optics installed just to see what all the fuss was about.

“You could always describe it to me.” he retorted, shifting his weight slightly so his pauldron knocked against the larger mech’s forearm. Tesarus shrugged, treads shifting slightly with the movement.

“Purple.”

“So helpful.” Kaon drawled, and turned to face Tarn as their leader approached.

“If you really want it described, you’d do better to pick literally any other ‘con in the room.” he said drily. Tesarus let out an inarticulate grumble, drawing chuckles from the mechs on the couch. “Kadis III takes up the lower half of the window.” he gestured, tracing an arc in the air. “Behind it, Kadis shines through the atmosphere, illuminating the clouds.”

“It sounds like it looks beautiful.” Kaon smiled.

“It looks like victory.” Tarn clapped a hand on his shoulder. Kaon tilted his helm slightly, recalling the landscape they'd left behind when returning from their hunt. He did have memories of clouds, though they were several million years old since the partially-condensed vapor defied echolocation. That scene they'd left behind, fallen traitors to and enemies of the cause, rendered in clouds...

“That sounds-” he choked mid-sentence, pain lancing through every circuit in his frame. A strangled sound left his mouth, knees buckling and sending him crashing to the floor. He struggled to in-vent, something hot welling in his eyes and dribbling from his mouth as he dry-heaved. His ears were ringing, the tesla coils on his back firing sporadically as his team shouted.

He heaved again, more burning liquid hitting the floor between his hands. Someone was screaming, why were they screaming? His echolocation didn't work when people were screaming in a room this small. The pain spiked again, driving all thought from his helm as his limbs gave out. He didn't hit the floor though, instead catching in large hands and hanging limply from them.

“Kaon!”

His name, that was his name; his team, his _friends_ , were calling him. He spasmed, servos screaming as his limbs strained against nothing. He tried to open his mouth to ask what was wrong, and found it already open. Oh, he realized distantly, the screams were coming from him. He was screaming, energon leaking from his mouth and optic sockets, sourceless agony igniting his every circuit.

A hand gripped his own, and he struggled to focus on the voice talking to him through the pain. Was he dying? Was this what dying felt like? A voice barked an order, and he was hauled up to his knees as a hand clamped over his mouth. His spark flared, panic flooding his processor. He couldn’t vent, couldn’t move, couldn’t _see_. Hot energon was heavy on his glossa, tracking down his faceplate, leaking through the fingers that kept him from screaming. His optics, they’d taken his optics.

Someone screamed behind him, and he curled forwards as his coils powered up, discharging bolts of electricity which grounded on the floor in a protective cage, static tingles working up his legs. He tried to scream, but all that came out was a low, strained noise.

“Speak to me, Kaon!” a voice demanded, and a shudder wracked his frame. That wasn’t his name, not his name. He was- he was- he was screaming again, or almost. With energon in his vents and in his voicebox he couldn’t make a sound more than a pitiful wheeze.

“Tell me how I can help!” the voice demanded, and he curled in on himself as electricity exploded out from his coils. They shut down immediately after, and he vaguely registered a ping about overheating before the pain rushed back in. He opened his mouth, drops of energon falling from his lips to land in the puddle on the floor, and couldn’t manage so much as a whisper. The pain was moving, concentrating, the circuitry around his spark searing with it.

His _spark_. It was flaring and guttering by turns, but each flare was dimmer and each gutter longer. He was- dying? He knew death, he’d been _built_ for it, but it didn’t seem real. Why him? Why- a footstep ran behind him, and he reflexively lashed out with a surge of electricity. Or rather, he tried to. All he got out of it was a painful jolt that locked up his servos and scrambled his processor, sending him tipping forwards. Hands locked around his upper arms, and he slipped into merciful stasis.

\---

“Kaon?”

He groaned, booting up the echolocation protocols for his coils, and confirmed it was Helex leaning over him. “Th’frag’m I in medbay for?” he mumbled, mouth only half online.

“He’s awake!” Helex called, and Kaon winced at the volume. His cranial casing hurt like, frag, it hurt _exactly_ like it had after events he’d prefer to leave buried and forgotten, and the rest of him didn’t feel much better. Like he’d gone five rounds sparring with Tesarus, easy. He tried to sit up, and groaned. Correction, five rounds with Tesarus followed by ten with Helex.

“Easy, there.” Tarn said softly, laying a hand on Kaon’s shoulder and easing him back down onto the recharge slab. “Vos says you came close to complete spark burnout earlier, and most of your systems are half fried.”

“Explains why I feel like slag.” he let his helm fall back to hit the berth under him with a dull ring. “Where’s the others?”

“Recharging.” Tarn kept a hand on his arm, his touch gentle. “Vos was already drained from the mission, and you gave Tesarus a nasty shock.”

“What happened?” Kaon asked as Helex moved to get something from the other side of the room.

“We don’t know.” Tarn admitted. “But apparently it wasn’t an isolated incident.” he lifted the pad in his hands, and looked it over briefly. “There’s reports coming in from all over of bots collapsing without apparent cause, and a number of the incidents are similar to yours. Bleeding from optic sockets and mouth, intense pain, spark damage or shrinkage discovered in the aftermath.”

Kaon turned his head until his optic sockets were pointed at Tarn’s mask. “Spark shrinkage?”

“We’d need to bring you to a professional to be sure, but Vos said there’s no immediate danger. A year or few off your life, at most.”

“And really, since when have any of us expected to live to obsolescence?” Helex joked, setting a second chair down opposite the one Tarn now occupied.

“Since when, indeed.” Tarn’s face was, as ever, hidden by his mask, but the amusement was clear in his voice. “Still, you’re not to leave this berth until morning or your systems are all back online.”

“Understood.” Kaon nodded, the movement stiff and not quite comfortable. He wasn’t going to be getting much recharging done, and getting back into stasis was likely a lost cause for the night, but he could idle until morning.

“Which is why we’re keeping you company!” Helex proclaimed, and pulled out-

“How do you expect me to move my piece in a board game when I can barely move my fingers?” Kaon deadpanned in reaction to the box, which rattled slightly as Helex set it down.

“I’ll move it for you.” Helex said, and placed a little handheld next to Kaon’s helm. It was part of the game, a money-counter, this one modified by the last Vos to say the number in addition to displaying it any time a button was pressed. “We’re gonna have to put the board on you, though.”

Kaon chuckled, and found himself grinning despite the ache which lingered in his chassis. Given his friends, Vos would likely get here in the morning and find them both asleep in their chairs.

He couldn’t imagine anywhere he’d rather be.


End file.
